Since the first case report in 1981, AIDS quickly spreads to countries around the world. So far, there is still no available effective anti-HIV vaccine, so the development of anti-AIDS drugs is still the most prospective route for the treatment of AIDS. At present, anti-AIDS drugs mainly include the following three categories: nucleotide antiviral drugs, transcriptase inhibitors and protease inhibitors. However, because of their high price (more than two or three hundred thousand Yuan is needed for each person each year), and relatively great side effects, these drugs are beyond the reach of the average family. Therefore, it is urgent to develop an anti-AIDS drug that is simple to use, low price, highly potent, and low toxicity. In recent years, natural products have shown promising results in the treatment of AIDS. Until now, it has been that there are more than 100 kinds of natural products which have good anti-HIV activity, such as: glycyrrhizin, hypericin, curcumin, soy saponins, camptothecin, lentinan, smallpox protein and so on.
Lignans, which are isolated from a traditional Chinese medicine—Schisandra by the applicant in recent years, show a very strong inhibitory effect on HIV integrase, and are able to inhibit the transcription of HIV-1, which can be developed to be anti-AIDS drugs (CN1634031A; CN1931151A; CN101318950A). Also, these natural products can be used as a lead compound, and serve as a template for the design of new drugs having a stronger biological activity. To date, there is no report in the prior art relating to nitrogen-containing biphenyl compounds, nor is there any report relating to use of this class of compounds as anti-AIDS drugs.